Movin’ on without you
by So Guhn
Summary: She knows the sky’s not the limit. Lelouch/Zero x Kallen.


Set pre-Turn 18.

_Movin' on without you_** - PG13 - romance/surrealism - Lelouch/Zero x Kallen**

Something about the colour of the sky.

Something about the way her heart quakes.

Something about them.

Kallen holds the mask, heavy ("Isn't it?" C.C.'s voice comes in a rushed murmur across the panels of her mind, hovering about like combustible gas) she holds her breath to let it all out in words. His dark figure, that cape, flickering about the ankles, his equally dark hair- she knows not where the wind comes from only it rushes before them, coldly.

How many days have passed since she has known, since she has decided, since she has whispered broken hearted, "You used us Japanese?"

Since she has wondered, "Why is he you?"

Since she has believed over and over, quaked and quivering faith, unsure and surer than anything, the dysfunctional allusion of darker grey on decadent midnight- she must believe in him. She bites her lip, holding that mask to him, praying that till the end he will flawlessly be Zero.

Flawlessly be the Zero she loves.

--

"It's a lie you know."

A splash.

The static radio fights against the air that escapes through the speakers.

"That anyone can don the mask of Zero, anyone can be Zero."

Fidgeting, nails tapping about the wood, rocking.

"Sure anyone can wear the mask, but... you are Zero."

"Only you can be the real Zero because you made him, right?"

(Because I love him.)

"Your Zero..."

Choking, strangled.

"Lelouch, only he will do!"

--

She doesn't move for once.

Sitting upon that chair, dust can land long enough with how much her arms twist and refold over and over, as her legs. Sometimes she tries to sit like him, dignified and folded about in his own way that demands authority. It doesn't really work. He's far more charismatic on his feet, when he moved it was like the trembling of autumn turning into cold and pure winter. That comparison, that such a freezing season may be more hopeful than spring, she cannot help it. Why do you need hope when flowers bloom and birds sing? Hope is only necessary when there is nothing, like the endless fields of snow, white and untouched, chilling you to the very marrow of your bones. Captivating even in your misery. Zero, that's how he was. How he should remain, she had been so careful not to leave her footprints, that when she had turned to see them about her she knew ("Lelouch is Zero. You're Zero... aren't you?")

Kallen rises, stands in her little cell as the lights flicker off and die.

--

It's not hot enough to be summer.

Ripples across the surface as the small rowboat makes itself go along. The oars lazily plunged alongside and hooked. His white hand dips into the water that is too unclear to be shallow.

"Kallen."

She hates it when he uses that voice. With that face. Not that there was a face that voice had gone along with, there had been none only- that glass and metal and dark reflecting shadow, maybe she saw her face when she had tried to see deeper, past her reflection. How had she missed it?

Turning to look at her, surrounding them is only-

The hand tilts up so that water runs down from it, mocking the grains of sand.

"If you look over the water, does it not look like the sky? Because of the reflection..."

A little rain- just made from the palm of his hand.

"It's like we're in the sky."

--

A crash, the building has been busted into, crumbling all along the sides the building. Before the lights had turned off she had not known whether it be day or night.

A familiar knightmare makes its place at the path that leads to her captivity.

It is night.

--

She wants to place her hands in the water, because the water that has fallen from his hands will surely fall into hers if she acts now.

It passes.

The day the Guren had been given wings, that day was like a victory by that mere fact, though it had ended in failure. To fight in the sky, across it, about it, through it. Taking them down one by one as her duty, her mission, her life. He falling and she catching.

It was quite different now.

"Hey. The boat. Hey!"

Quickening splash across, moving, wetness across her thighs and knees, and ankles and feet and- grabbing him by the collar- tugging, "The boat is filling with water!"

She has to protect him, she has to protect him, she has to- "We're sinking, we're-"

Placing a hand bout her wrist, holding it there as if in contemplative cradle. A smile nor frown graces his face, and the reason is because- she realizes- the mask is in place. "Flying."

Under.

"Zero."

--

The door snaps open, something like a switch is tucked about his clothes as he makes steady steps toward her, that massive black frame barely glossy under the moonlight. She sways about her feet; they are sealed to the place, almost. Thudding in her ears, she almost brings her hands to cover them, the loud sound.

But they are silent, as over the sound of her heart are his resolved footsteps, louder than anything even as echoes- vibrating across the round, near hollow room.

--

They're drowning, they're dead aren't they?

She looks around. Instead of water below, she can only look up, up and up as they plunge upward into the cloud above. She barely hears him over the slowly rushing air that reaches her ears and through them.

"I told you it looked like the sky."

--

Miracles.

Zero is the creator of miracles. Once when her heart thudded to its own rhythm, a rhythm she had no control over either- she thought _he_ was a miracle. The thudding starts on that track again, one step, two step, he comes forward, and then she's stumbling out, and half running, half walking, her arms inclining forward and when they almost meet to wrap around his body the mask he had taken off (when when when?) is thrown from her, the callous thud hitting and bouncing a little ways behind, not tilting off the edge but near it still as he answers by wrapping her arms around her, her face shoved against his shoulder, apologizing softly, once, twice. She didn't realize when her fists started to pound against his shoulders, his chest- a mere second later, sure enough to leave blotchy bruises (he bruises like a peach, Lelouch) she must have started hitting him when she realised she had started crying.

Her words don't come out as angry as she hoped.

"Why didn't you come for me sooner, why didn't you-"

Then she allows herself to be held, wanting to save her strength for what lies ahead. The battle, the war, Zero has only needed her for one purpose, to protect him, to fight for him, to be the Ace Pilot. But Lelouch-

--

It's simple.

When she closes her eyes she sees this, them rowing out in the little boat, across a lake, a river, a sea. Aimlessly. The sun is always bright, it is always just them. When she opens her eyes the image, the illusion is gone.

It happens again. This time they do not cut cut cut from here, sinking, the sky, it is not repetitious- but only to a fault. They must always start here once again. She will start to row and her arms actually do get tired, but he doesn't offer to row, just let's them carry on, there is no rush. They're not going any where.

But this time, he's rowing the boat.

There's a lump in her throat, she's not supposed to remember he isn't supposed to be rowing.

--

She wonders what happened to the radio.

He had been the one to throw it over the boat after all. But she doesn't ask him, already accepting every apology he continues to murmur against her hair, pulling him closer, knowing this won't last. He has to put the mask back on. (But isn't that what she wants?) She has to find the Guren, she has to go fight. They have to go fight.

Frantic.

--

One more time.

She wanted to say something like good bye. But this is what she gets. The oars must have floated else where in her daydreaming. All that remains is the mask, sitting where he should be (why should he be there, again?) she ignores the question. Too many are running through her fingers, under her skin as she moves forward, weight shifting forward, boat dipping ever ever slight, she picks up the mask, sunlight glinting off the polished, top, side. Holding it between her hands.

Kallen turns it over and looks inside.

"Only your Zero will do."

She puts it on.


End file.
